Let's Call it Zerothink
Sam Aurelius Milam III
"Since
about that time, war had been literally continuous, though strictly speaking
it had not always been the same war. For several months during his
childhood there had been confused street fighting in London itself, some
of which he remembered vividly. But to trace out the history of the
whole period, to say who was fighting whom at any given moment, would have
been utterly impossible, since no written record, and no spoken word, ever
made mention of any other alignment than the existing one. At this
moment, for example, in 1984 (it if was 1984), Oceania was at war with
Eurasia and in alliance with Eastasia. In no public or private utterance
was it ever admitted that the three powers had at any time been grouped
along different lines. Actually, as Winston well knew, it was only
four years since Oceania had been at war with Eastasia and in alliance
with Eurasia. But that was merely a piece of furtive knowledge which
he happened to possess because his memory was not satisfactorily under
control. Officially the change of partners had never happened.
Oceania was at war with Eurasia: therefore Oceania had always been
at war with Eurasia. The enemy of the moment always represented absolute
evil, and it followed that any past or future agreement with him was impossible....
"The
Party said that Oceania had never been in alliance with Eurasia.
He, Winston Smith, know that Oceania had been in alliance with Eurasia
as short a time as four years ago. But where did that knowledge exist?
Only in his own consciousness, which in any case must soon be annihilated.
And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed — if all records
told the same tale — then the lie passed into history and became truth.
'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future:
who controls the present controls the past.' And yet the past, though
of its nature alterable, never had been altered. Whatever was true
now was true from everlasting to everlasting. It was quite simple.
All that was needed was an unending series of victories over your own memory.
'Reality control,' they called it; in Newspeak, 'doublethink.' "
I
call it zerothink and I see it in most Americans. They accept the
statements of the U.S. government just as gullibly as the citizens of Oceania
accepted the statements of the Party, in Orwell's book. For example,
they believe that the U.S. government never supported Saddam Hussein, that
he has always been the enemy, merely because he is presently proclaimed
to be evil. They also believe that General Musharif has always been
a U.S. ally and that he wouldn't think of overthrowing a democratically
elected government. They even believe that terrorists are more dangerous
than politicians.
If
Americans are so gullible about recent events, consider how gullible they
must be about the more distant past. Consider the so-called Civil
War. Among the false beliefs is the name itself. In the South
that war is, or was, correctly called The War Between the States.
Yet another deception is that slavery was illegal within the union at that
time. In fact, anti-slavery laws were unconstitutional.
| No person held to service or labor
in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in
consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service
or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such
service or labor may be due.
— U.S. Constitution
Article IV, Section 2, clause 3 |
"Person"
in that provision includes slaves. The northern states routinely
violated it by refusing to return escaped slaves and by enacting legislation
that freed slaves who escaped into non slave states. The abolition
of slavery should have been accomplished by amending the Constitution,
not by violating it. In the meantime, slavery was constitutional.
The
mention of slavery at this late date might seem irrelevant. However,
the fact is that slavery wasn't abolished. Only American zerothink
has allowed the deception to succeed.
Consider
the Fourteenth Amendment.
| All persons born or naturalized
in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens
of the United States....
— U.S. Constitution, Fourteenth Amendment
|
The
meaning of jurisdiction is "power and control". Thus, citizens are
under the power and control of the U.S. government. That sounds like
a pretty good definition of slavery.
| frontiersman@ida.net | Frontiersman,
479 E. 700 N., Firth, Idaho 83236
Also see Pharos at http://www.ida.net/users/pharos/ |
November 2002
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